


Unwanted

by QueenOfSkaro



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Angst, Bad Parenting, Fíli Whump, I meant it, I plan to put all my angst in there, Kid!Fic, Minor Character Death, Protective Bifur, baby!Kili, bad Dis, neglected Fili, unhappy Fili
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-14
Updated: 2016-04-18
Packaged: 2018-02-13 04:23:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 3,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2136876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenOfSkaro/pseuds/QueenOfSkaro
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dis can't stand to touch Fili after his father died, he just looked too much like her deceased One. But then comes Kili and she can love a child again. Too bad the plan doesn't include her first born.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

He should be happy, he knew that. He hadn't seen his Ma smile since that something happened to his Da, that made him never coming back home again. He had seen his Da, as his Uncle carried him into their kitchen, had tried to help, but he wasn't much use. He could just stand there, mostly in the way of others before he got to a new place where, too, someone more important had to stand. At the end he just sat under the table, directly under his Da, as all the older ones screamed and yelled and even months later he could still hear his Ma cry when he closed his eyes, even if she wasn't in the room. He cried too, but tried not to make a sound so as not to disturb anyone, because he knew that something very important was going on, something very bad and he just couldn't distract them.

Then, all of a sudden, everyone was silent and that was even worse, because now they would all hear him sniffing and he knew whatever bad they tried to prevent had happened and he knew it was something related to his Da. They murmurmed in low tones, he couldn't hear what they were saying and than they took his Da out of the kitchen again and he was alone. It was a few minutes before he gathered his courage and crawled back from under the table, but he wished at once he would still sit under it.   
There was blood, so much blood and the dwarfling didn't know there was that much of it in a dwarven body, he only ever cut himself a time or two while inspecting his Da's hunting knives and that was only ever a couple of drops. But this, this was - 

He stumbled back, unable to tear his gaze away, because even at five years old, he knew that his Da couldn't have survived this, would never come back to him and then he didn't quite remember what he did next, but he remembered getting yelled at by his Ma and Uncle because he obviously ran away and worried them. And then they told him, told him his Da wouldn't come back now, but he would wait for them in Mahals Halls. 

He knew he should be happy, but he just couldn't bring himself to. That little - thing - was making his Ma happy, she still cried but she was smiling now too and it was making that without doing anything even remotely useful. It was just shrieking the whole time, always crying and the dwarfling couldn't understand why his Ma was still smiling, because all he wanted to do was to give that thing back to Uncle Oin, there obviously was a mistake, they didn't need anymore crying in this house, thank you very much. His Ma was always crying and when he himself cried too, it never made Ma smile, she always told him to dwarf up and be a grown-up and he shouldn't start being silly now. That always shut him up real quick, because all he wanted was to be useful and his Uncle would tell him then that his Ma was allowed to cry, because she was carrying his little brother and that he shouldn't immitate it, because it wouldn't do for a prince to cry. The dwarfling always asked himself then why his Ma was still carrying this stupid little brother, even so he wasn't even hugged anymore since his Da went to the Halls, but he gave his best to just cry when he was alone, because he didn't want to be a disappointment.

Uncle lifted him up under his arms and sat him down on the bed his Ma and that stupid little thing were lying, the most physical contact the little boy had since his Da went away, but he wasn't given the chance to cling to his Uncle. Instead he had to look at that ugly little face that would live with them from now on, all wrinkly and red and a full head of dark locks and really, couldn't it just stop with all that crying? It diddn't do for a prince to cry, he really should now that.

"Say hello to your little brother, Fili. Come here and greet Kili.", his Ma said, voice soft and clogged but it was still said so nice that Fili couldn't obey her fast enough. That Kili was still ugly beyond belief - and he hated it that it got part of his name, but he knew it was tradition and he wasn't allowed to speak against it - but it stopped the shrieking the moment the little blonde uttered a forced 'Hullo'. Big bluish eyes looked at him so intently he would have thought that little thing had something like a brain and a second later there were two hands grabbing for him greedily. He leant away again quickly before it got hold of his hair.

"It will be your job, Fili, to always take care of your little brother, do you understand that? It is a really important task and you must always do your best.", his uncle said and the boy couldn't quite supress the flinch, but no one was looking at him, so nobody saw it. 

Talk about unwanted. The thing started to scream again.


	2. Chapter 2

His Ma stayed at home the first few weeks and Fili was really excited about that, because they didn't have any time together in basically forever - it was exactly after his Da left, but he tried really hard to not always think about it - but he was deeply disappointed. His Ma didn't even look at him all that often, always telling his Uncle to get him something to eat and if he wasn't there, well, no one knew that Fili hadn't eaten anything. She always stood above the cradle now placed beside her bed, or sat with that thing in her arms on a kitchen chair, being half naked and 'feeding him', they called it. The blonde tried a few times to get her attention, but she just waved him away and then that thing was crying again and maybe, just maybe and only if you won't tell Uncle, maybe he cried a bit too then, on those evenings. But he was alone and no one saw him, so it was alright, because no one could be mad at him if they didn't know it, right?

 

A few weeks was all his Ma managed staying at home. One afternoon he got told to look after the baby, be careful with him and she would be back in an hour, before she left and wouldn't come back until late in the evening, smelling of smoke and metal and sweat and looking content. She found Fili with his hands over his ears in his room, the baby screaming so loud it was a wonder she didn't hear it in front of the door and a deep purple face, obviously crying for a long while now. She yelled at Fili, backhanded him and send him to bed without dinner, screaming after him how disappointed she was in him and that she would never trust him with something so important again.

The blonde boy didn't thought that fair, because his Ma stayed way longer than she told him, but he didn't dare to tell her that and so he just curled under his thin blanket and cried, again, but he made sure to do it as silent as possible, because he didn't want to be like that ugly little thing.

 

He had tried so hard to help his Ma, even so what he least wanted was to be near that stupid 'little brother', but he tried. Kili started to scream mere minutes after his mother left, leaving him to try and make it stop again. He took a chair from the kitchen to the bedroom, standing on it he could look into the cradle to see the little face red and all wrinkled again, but guessed it was from the screaming now. Sighing he poked Kili into his cheek, startling a gurgle from it, before he went quiet instantly. His hands tried to grab him again, always greedy, but Fili took his hand away and out of reach. He wasn't going to let that thing touch him more than he needed to make it shut up. But as soon as the baby realized he wasn't going to get it, it started to scream again, this time louder. Again he poked it, but it wasn't enough so he tried to stroke his hair like his mother always did, once upon a time with him too. 

And as long as he kept touching it, it kept quite, staring at him with those big eyes that now looked more brown than blue - thank Mahal, Fili hated it that they shared eye-color - but it always wanted more. Not just his fingertips, his whole hand. Then it grabbed his arm, after that his hair. And he didn't want that and it hurt his head so he withdraw a little, but that just took them back to the screaming. Fili was desperate and he felt so helpless, his Ma should have come back ages ago and what if something happened to her too? And as he couldn't calm the baby short of crawling into the cradle too he stepped off the chair and left the room. He didn't want to hear it again and he wanted his Ma and his Uncle here and it just cried and cried and he didn't know what to do, so he just curled in on himself and covered his ears. It was still so, so long until his Ma came back home and yelled at him. And no, he really didn't thought it fair.


	3. Chapter 3

The market place was full of people bustling about each other, haggling and yelling and talking and laughing - and walking around without looking down.  
And why would they?  
Kili was carried in a sling on Mas front, snug tight against her and in no danger to get stepped on. Instead he looked around wide awake and cried with heartful laughter at all the things offered to him. Everyone fussed over him, because the community adored babies, cute ones, those who are sturdy and resilient, like Kili - not like Fili, who always got in the way and shied away from things without a reason - because he was weird. No one fussed over him or told him how sturdy and strong he was, even though he could lift really big stones and stuff and could be quiet for long periods of time - important for surprise attacks as soon as he was a warrior - and ...  
no one bothered, instead they gave baby Kili a slice of apple like old lady Terrin or a piece of meat from Wada, the dwarf from the other side of the Blue Mountains, where it was obviously possible to grow meat and sell it, even though it was too expensive for most of the village. And he just wasted it on the crybaby.  
Ma thanked them all real polite, like Fili knew was expected - he knew his manners, thank you. He just seldom had the chance to proof it.  
As they walked from Wadas stall Ma didn't mention the other hungry mouth and Fili didn't dare to speak up. No one noticed him trailing behind his family, trying not to reach out for his Mas skirts. He did that once and got his hand smacked for it. It didn't hurt half as bad as the smack last week, but he still didn't wish for a repeat, so he kept his hands balled up into little fists inside his threadbare tunic.  
He was cold and frightened and had to jump out of the way of yet another dwarf waltzing right over the place he previously stood in.  
It wasn't half as surprising as it should have been as he stumbled into the small stall of a mean looking dwarf with a wicked axe - in his forehead!  
It wasn't necessary for his Ma to yell at him. And it wasn't needed to grab his ear hard enough to make his eyes water - in public, Uncle will be disappointed when he heard that. It wasn't proper for a prince.  
Maybe he just wasn't proper for a prince, but don't let Uncle know, the times he told him about his upcoming responsibilty were the only times he got really talked to anymore.  
That was the reason his voice cracked from disuse as he screamed apology after apology at the vendor, praying that he wouldn't be anymore punished. He was so hungry already, he didn't want to go another day without something to eat.  
There was a harsh garble coming from the stranger, spoken in the old language Fili recognised but couldn't understand. It was a part of his Uncles lessons a few months back and he remembered him and Lord Balin talking like that once or twice.  
Khuzdul.  
The language of the dwarves. Fili was in awe of the wild looking merchant, even though he probably wouldn't eat for the next day. Ma looked furious and answered and Kili started crying again and the blond just wanted to crawl under the nearest table, but the toy he pushed off the stall lay there, broken, and he tried really hard not to cry like the baby, but he didn't know how he could manage that.  
A young dwarf, not a dwarfling anymore but near enough, appeared in his blurry vision, the toy in hand.  
"Stop cryin', silly. Look, nothin' happened.", he said, a thick accent underlying his words - or was it Fili that always talked funny? He crouched down and shoved some sort of puzzle under his nose, made of four pieces of wood, fitting perfectly into each other.  
Not broken. He didn't break it.  
"Yer can play with it. Want'a play wit' me a little?", the other asked and grinned brightly and Fili automatically grinned back.  
This boy was so nice to him! And he wanted to play. Fili couldn't believe his luck, no one had played with him in ages!  
The nod wasn't halfway through as his Ma grabbed his shoulder roughly, shoving him infront of her and marched him off without another word.  
Later, when the baby cried again and Fili was done crying but still felt really sad he wasn't allowed to play he traced his shoulder with the tip of his finger, enjoying the tingly remainder that his Ma had touched him.


	4. Chapter 4

The crybaby was crawling all around the house now and everyone thought that was great.  
It wasn't a really big achievement in Filis opinion, who learned how to sword-fight from Master Dwalin now and was able to drag himself to his lessons even though he hurt all over. Master Dwalin called it self-control. Fili called it punishment for not being good enough, but he would never say that aloud. Everyone said it enough already.  
The most obvious downside to the things newfound mobility was that he seemed to be everywhere Fili went, no matter how often he fled. The one time he tried to toe the gurgling baby away - and he was careful, he was, he only shoved really slowly to get his point across - he got beaten up by his Ma so bad he was allowed to cancel his lessons the next day. 

It found its way into his room.   
The one time he forgot to close his door Kili sped through the hallway and into the littlest bedroom. And then he, ever so slowly, pulled himself up holding onto the bed. And grinned brightly with gaping teeth and gleaming brown eyes and for a moment Fili felt warm all over. That was the moment he heard the front door and Ma and Uncle were talking loudly and there wasn't any reason it was alright for them to be even prouder of his brother. The baby. That thing.  
He grabbed it under its arms and carried it into the living room. It didn't try to stand up again as he sat it back on the floor. Ma and Uncle gushed about it anyway.

Most days Fili wasn't allowed to leave the house except for his sword lessons he had in the backyard of his uncles forge a few houses down the road.  
Sometimes he needed to go to Lord Balin for history lessons, because Uncle said he needed to smarten up to be a prince. And then there were market days, which were the absolute worst in his opinion. He needed to carry lots of stuff, because his Ma needed to carry the baby and he had to watch her get things for Kili and nothing for him, because there wasn't enough money to get some for both of them.  
She bought sweets for the baby once, a whole four pieces and while Fili seethed in envy Kili reached over from his place perched on the bench to offer some to his brother and - maybe he wasn't all that bad. He gave him sweets, too. And he grinned brightly again, like he never even showed their Ma and maybe, maybe Fili was wrong about him.  
Smiling, still unsure about the situation, he reached out to take it, but just as he was about to take a bite it got snatched away from him.  
His outcry was met with a sharp hand on his cheek.  
"How dare you steal from your brother? Don't you have any honor in your mingy body? I'm ashamed of you.", his Ma hissed lowly between her teeth so no one heard.  
"But - ", he started to explain - he didn't steal, Kili gave it to him, but that only got him another slap.  
"Not a word.", she demanded and took the baby, placing him on her hip and the sweets in her satchel. Then she turned her back on him and left him to stay or to follow. Swallowing his tears down he ran after them, not noticing wild, sad eyes on him.


	5. Chapter 5

It started a few months ago, that no one bothered to look for him anymore, when he wasn't at home. It didn't even strike him as odd that he could slink through the streets without anyone there to supervise him. It wasn't out of the ordinary for him to be seen on the other end of the village, even though no one particularly bothered to notice him.  
No one but a dwarf with an axe in his head and so much pain for this little boy in his heart he couldn't help himself but send his little cousin Bofur to fetch him once he saw him again.  
The little blond seemed wary and cautious, but agreeable enough to follow a strange dwarf into a strange home inhabited by another two dwarves he didn't know - one of them not even capable to speak common tongue.  
That was so wrong on so many levels Bifur refused to let that continue. Not with him being able to do something about it.  
Glaringly obvious was the fact that Fili didn't know what to do with this situation. He knew them, they were the toymakers he always saw on the market. Sometimes he watched them, because the two youngest seemed to always be smiling and laughing with each other. He heard they were brothers and Fili couldn't get behind the reason they got on so good with each other.  
Inside the house was small and cluttered, but comfortable in a way the prince didn't have words for, because he never needed them. He wasn't comfortable for a long time.  
Bofur still had his hand in his as he pulled him to a workbench full of - stuff.  
Not having a better description was frustrating, because he really wanted to know what they were, wanted to understand, wanted to prove he wasn't stupid.   
But he didn't have time to worry about that for long, because Bofur launched into a long explanation of the making of toys. And, after leaving the house with a tummy full of tea and a little snack, he asked himself if he was welcome to come back.

He shouldn't have worried. Bofur always seemed to be able to find him, no matter where he went. And Bofur brought him to Bombur and Bifur, who looked at him softly and gave him bread and sometimes sweets and who played with him and let him play with all new toys - and not raised his voice at him once.


	6. Chapter 6

The little bird was always Filis favourite toy at Bofurs and Bifurs and Bomburs place. There were a few different birds, but this one was russet coloured and shined with the light and the wings moved like it could fly for real.  
And it was the gift he got for his tenths birthday. He even got a cake, a small one, but it was the first he could remember and he stared at Bifur, who was still a little white-bearded from flour and he didn't know what to say. He felt stupid until Bofur laughed and told him to eat up so they could play. So that's what he did. And afterwards he was allowed to take his very own toy home with him.  
It almost didn't matter that no one else even mentioned his birthday.

It took two days for his Ma to notice his birdie and as he launched into an enthusiastic speech about his plays he couldn't even get a word out, his Ma already started yelling.  
And Fili really didn't know why she thought he stole it, no matter how often he tried to explain that it was a gift, she wouldn't believe him.  
Who would make an effort for him, anyway?  
The more she yelled the more slaps came and Fili sunk into himself, making himself as small as he could.  
Maybe he really got it wrong? What if he did steal it? Did he steal from Bifur?

He didn't dare to visit them again. He stole from them, they wouldn't want him there anymore anyway.  
He'd ruined it.  
His Ma took the toy from him after she finished her yelling and gave it Kili. She was furious that she had to pay for it, she said. And she was even more furious when she came back from the merchants. They probably told her how clingy he was, how intrusive, how annoying.  
He took his blanket off his bed and crawled under it, pressing himself into the corner and making himself as small as he could under his blanket.   
He didn't cry. He needed to start being a grown-up.

**Author's Note:**

> Will upload as I write, but I don't plan to work on it regularly. This is my personal angst-fest, it just takes a shitty mood to get anything done here. I'll probably just fluff it up again before long, that's just what I write. Just so you're warned. And between us, there's no one I wish a happier ending than Fili.


End file.
